International air traffic growing

Updated 10:24 am, Thursday, October 25, 2012

A study says international traffic is increasing at San Antonio's airport.

A study says international traffic is increasing at San Antonio's airport.

Photo: Express-News File Photo

International air traffic growing

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San Antonio has made a solid contribution to the explosive growth that international air travel has enjoyed in the United States over the past two decades, a new Brookings Institution study shows.

The study, called Global Gateways: International Aviation in Metropolitan America, said international air travel into and out of San Antonio grew by 18.4 percent from 2003 to 2011, which was the 40th highest rate among the top 100 metropolitan areas that researchers examined.

The growth left San Antonio with 556,600 international passengers in 2011, the 33rd best in the study. That was just better than Austin's international passenger count of 527,373 and just behind the count in Kansas City, 557,716.

Mayor Julián Castro said he was pleased with the growth depicted in the study but added “we still have a long way to go.”

“I'd like to see us expand flights to other parts of Mexico and other parts of the world,” he said.

The mayor also said international passenger counts for this year could improve the city's standing since AirTran Airways, Interjet and VivaAerobus added flights from San Antonio to Mexico late last year or this year.

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Aeromexico also announced plans to increase the size of the aircraft serving its San Antonio to Mexico City route in July.

Those changes have helped boost international passenger counts at San Antonio International Airport by 150 percent for the first eight months of 2012 compared to the same period last year, aviation department records show.

“I think 2012 numbers will be significantly higher than 2011,” said Barbara Prossen, community relations director for the aviation department.

She said international passenger counts should keep growing as activity in the Eagle Ford Shale area south of San Antonio expands and more companies develop international ties.

“It'll be more business driven than tourism driven,” Prossen said.

The Brookings study used the most recent data it could obtain — from 2011 — and compared it to the pre-recession year of 2003 to assess international travel in the 100 largest metropolitan areas.

It took a broader look at international air travel for the nation as a whole and determined it had more than doubled since 1990 — a 117 percent increase compared to a 53 percent increase in the domestic passenger count.

Brookings called the study a first-of-its-kind evaluation that looked at travel flows between major U.S. metro areas and international destinations, identifying which routes were the most popular for each city.

By showing what cities and regions have drawn more international traffic and which airports are the most heavily used, researchers hoped to aid decision makers in allocating capital resources and planning for growth.

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International from S.A.

The top 10 cities internationally that received the most air traffic both to and from San Antonio in 2011 were:

1. Mexico City: 107,536 passengers

2. Cancun, Mexico: 25,281 passengers

3. London: 23,957 passengers

4. Monterrey, Mexico: 19,616 passengers

5. Frankfurt, Germany: 18,130 passengers

6. Guadalajara, Mexico: 15,102 passengers

7. Toronto, Canada: 14,866 passengers

8. Calgary, Canada: 10,204 passengers

9. Vancouver, Canada: 9,301 passengers

10. Seoul, South Korea: 9,252 passengers

Source: Brookings Institution

Data on San Antonio's international traffic show that 23.9 percent of its service came on direct flights. That ranked San Antonio 31st nationally.

Mexico City, Cancún, and London were the three most popular cities for international flights to and from San Antonio, the study said.

But whereas passenger counts on flights to Mexico City increased by 28.6 percent between 2003 and 2011, those counts to Cancún fell by almost 41 percent in that period to 25,281. London traffic to San Antonio grew by 5.6 percent over those years.